This paper aims to contribute to the literature on knowledge
construction and knowledge sharing within the field of
organizational communication. The research underlines the importance
of exploring human learning contextually, descriptively,
interpretively, and inductively. Through a participant‑observer
methodological approach, the study contributes to the literature by
introducing detrivialization as a strategy to explore ’participants’
rhetoric related to their organizational procedures. The paper
describes a case study that took place for 18 months in a cancer
research lab in Belgium, where employees seemed unable to question
several taken‑for‑granted practices. The present research primarily
reveals the consequences of trivialization, when the rationale of
essential organizational practices go unnoticed until
observer‑participant challenges the status quo. Also, the study
highlights the outcomes of the detrivialization approach, which
triggers unprecedented knowledge. Finally, the paper introduces the
(de)trivialization dynamic model, which can depict the consequences
of opening black‑boxes in organizational contexts. This research is
a new approach in organizational ethnomethodology, revisiting
’Garfinkel’s (1967) breaching experiment to describe science in
action. The suggested model offers a methodological approach for
exploring trivialized organizational dynamics and challenging
groupthink. Detrivialization is an opposite approach to
trivialization, to offer a new debate topic to scholars aiming to
conduct ethnographic research and discourse analysis in
organizational communication.